The Copenhagen Climate Conference, charged with crafting a new international agreement to curb climate change, ended in failure, with the text of the accord recognizing the need to act but containing no commitments to do so.

The climate demonstration in Copenhagen on December 12, with over 100,000 participants, was the biggest climate protest ever. It had a strong anti-capitalist character, with our socialist CWI contingent chanting, "Save the planet - smash the system - what we need is socialism." This is a report from Swedish socialist activists at the demonstration.

Climate change is accelerating. On November 4 the North Pole ice cap fell below the record lows for early November set in 2007.

Amidst a wave of new climate research showing increasingly severe danger from global warming, the successor committee to the 1997 Kyoto Accord will be convening in Copenhagen this December.

New research is claiming that concentrations of carbon dioxide (the main greenhouse gas, CO2) will remain high for at least 1,000 years, even if greenhouse gases are eliminated in the next few decades.

More than 11 years after the establishment of the Kyoto Protocol, the U.S. House has passed the Waxman-Markey bill, the first greenhouse gas reduction measure to clear either house of Congress. While legislation in the U.S. to address climate change is long overdue, the bill falls far short of what is urgently needed.

The Obama administration promises that its economic stimulus will address the environmental crisis with its focus on environmental investment and “green-collar jobs.” Obama’s budget also takes aim at the crisis with its expansions in funding for environmental programs and research, including a 34.6% increase in the budget for the Environmental Protection Agency.

The death toll from Victoria’s bushfires currently stands at 181 and could rise much further. The bushfire disaster has shown some of the best examples of human solidarity coupled with some of the worst examples of the failure of a profit driven system.

Barack Obama made a call for an environmental "New Deal" a centerpiece of his presidential campaign, promising to spend $150 billion on sustainable technology. Will green Keynesianism be effective in tackling climate change? And, perhaps most significantly, what will be the chances of the adoption of a Keynesian approach on a world scale that would be necessary for it to have a real impact?

The questions of global warming and high gas prices are hot topics in the media. The politicians are talking about a number of different solutions. Will these solutions help or hurt the environment? Will they be able to provide relief from high gas prices?

China faces the most terrifying ecological crisis in the world. There are no parallels in peacetime for such monumental degradation of a country’s natural resources, water and land.

The world faces the horrifying prospect of major climate change with its potential for catastrophic impact on food production and living conditions across the world. Yet, the political leaders of the major capitalist economies failed to agree on any meaningful action on this question at the recent G8 meeting in Japan.

The looming environmental catastrophe has provoked an urgent search for solutions to stop global warming and save the planet for future generations.

A great deal of hype has been generated recently by the prospect of “greener” biofuels such as ethanol and biodiesel. In reality, however, the potential of these new energy sources to halt climate change is small, while their use will undoubtedly exacerbate many of the problems facing the world’s working class.

When even oil-man George Bush, in a recent State of the Union address, refers to the “challenge of climate change,” you know it’s serious.